The stu­dent group’s hard work has cer­tainly paid off: In Feb­ruary, the group received the 2014 Pre­mier Chapter Award from its parent orga­ni­za­tion, EWB-​​USA. “The EWB-​​USA North­eastern Uni­ver­sity chapter con­tinues as a stal­wart among university-​​based EWB-​​USA chap­ters,” the parent orga­ni­za­tion wrote in a news release posted on its web­site. “The chapter’s ded­i­ca­tion is also evi­denced by its level of involve­ment with regional and national EWB-​​USA events.”

The high honor marked the first national award for Northeastern’s group, which was founded in 2005 and has since brought clean water to thou­sands of vil­lagers in Hon­duras and Uganda. Since its incep­tion, Northeastern’s chapter of EWB has also won three regional awards.

“It’s no small task we do but it is def­i­nitely rewarding,” said Kelly O’Connell, E’16, the group’s vice pres­i­dent of admin­is­tra­tion. “Not only are we learning and ben­e­fiting from this work, but we are also helping other people.”

In order to qualify for the award, the group had to fill out an appli­ca­tion that asked for an update on cur­rent projects; an expla­na­tion for how the group keeps its mem­bers involved; and a run­down of the group’s work with EWB-​​USA. A focus of the group’s appli­ca­tion was EWB Boot­camp!, a semi­an­nual event hosted at North­eastern that intro­duces new mem­bers to the orga­ni­za­tion and con­nects chap­ters from around New Eng­land to share ideas.

North­eastern EWB com­prises 60 mem­bers, all of whom work on two water dis­tri­b­u­tion projects: one in Uganda and one in Hon­duras. The Hon­duras team has suc­cess­fully com­pleted four projects in dif­ferent com­mu­ni­ties in the Yoro Dis­trict and is working along­side a fifth com­mu­nity on the final phase of a project to help bring clean water to a vil­lage there. They hope to begin the final stages of imple­men­ta­tion in December.

As a result of United States-​​ordered travel restric­tions, a team of EWB alumni has been trav­eling to Hon­duras to imple­ment the group’s designs.

“We go to another country and hope­fully affect the lives of hun­dreds of people with our exper­tise,” said Brandon Hornak, E’17, the project director of the Hon­duras group. “It’s very rewarding.”

The Uganda project team has planned three working trips for the remainder of this year; the third one, in August, will cul­mi­nate in the com­ple­tion of five com­mu­nity tap stands. In the past five years the team has con­structed and reha­bil­i­tated rain­water catch basin sys­tems at schools in the vil­lage and drilled two deep wells fitted with hand-​​pumps, while the stu­dents in Boston designed the water dis­tri­b­u­tion system the team is now implementing.

“It has been an aggres­sive year,” said Catherine McManus, E’16, the project design leader of the Uganda group.

Working in dif­ferent coun­tries through EWB, she noted, pro­vides mem­bers with a cul­tural edu­ca­tion out­side of engi­neering, one that will con­tinue to become more robust: Since Northeastern’s chapter of EWB is growing and the Hon­duras project is almost com­plete, the group is looking to begin a third water dis­tri­b­u­tion project in Cen­tral or Latin America. “We are not jumping right into it,” O’Connell said. “We’ve been looking on and off for the past year and want a project that we can really work well with.”

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About the Writer

Joe O'Connell is a staff writer for News@Northeastern. A former newspaper reporter and editor, Joe came to Northeastern after working for three different daily newspapers in Massachusetts. Joe is a UNH grad and is finding it difficult to pick which hockey team to cheer for. When he isn't working, Joe can be found watching Boston's sports teams in their athletic endeavors, playing golf badly, and washing hospital scrubs. Follow him on Twitter @joconnell_nu

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